Titans Gotham
by GreenTitan
Summary: AU. What if the Titans weren't formed in the same way they were in the series? What if they were trained... by Batman? Rated T for occasional language. Any romance will be RobxStar & BBxRae, or BatmanxCatwoman
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Hi guys! I wrote a BB/Rae oneshot a while back… a long while back. Probably no one remembers it. It's on my profile. So, I wanted to create a story about the Teen Titans… a long one. One that contains Batman. Because Batman = the pown. So if you like that kind of stuff, please keep reading. I hope you guys enjoy! ^-^

**Chapter One**

Garfield Logan was not someone who enjoyed being messed with. He felt a faint rage at this man, who obviously thought it was funny to tell poor city kids like him that a great and tantalizing future was actually in front of him, when in reality, nothing could be less true.

"…very good school, you know, Garfield. Actually, it's fairly difficult to get in, but you have very good grades and I have some very good connections. I'm giving you the chance of a lifetime here."

Gar gritted his razor teeth and said he wanted to know what the catch was.

"There isn't one." Gar could scent faintly if he tried that the man was lying, and said so, sans the scenting part, obviously.

"You don't know that." The man sounded like he was mildly rebuking him. For some reason, this made Gar even angrier. He clenched his fists briefly.

"Look, Mr. Bruce Wayne." Gar was pleased to hear that his voice had the perfect amount of subtle sarcasm. It was something he'd been working on. "I've lived here a fair chunk of my life and I can tell when someone's trying to swindle me, okay? If you won't tell me what the fine print is here, I'm finished." He got up and left the room. He saw as he was shutting the door that the man Wayne looked faintly amused. He saw him open a cell phone as he left, and could hear him speaking through the walls as he walked away, though he was too far away to make out the words. He rolled his eyes. Bruce Wayne was obviously so busy swimming in dollars that he had to negotiate a business deal as soon as he was done trying to swindle teenagers. It was really ridiculous. Most rich people, Gar reflected, were really the same.

---------------

That night while Beast Boy was patrolling the city, he was accosted by a demented-looking kid in some ridiculously tight-fitting colorful Spandex. "Beast Boy!"

Beast Boy's catlike eyes glared at him fiercely. "What? Who are you?"

"I'm Robin. You've probably heard of me."

For some reason Beast Boy was feeling angry again. "Can't say that I have," he lied. Actually, he had heard something about a sidekick named Robin… supposedly Batman had taken him under his wing, but he didn't want to give this strange boy the satisfaction of knowing so.

The boy looked a little irritated, which did not surprise Beast Boy. "Look, I'm not to happy about dealing with small-time heroes like you either, but let's try to be civil, alright?"

"Who's not being civil?" Beast Boy muttered, too low for Christmas-tree boy to hear. "Small timers?" he spat. "Hey! I don't need some kid dressed up like some sort of _demented stoplight_ to tell me who's important around here! I've been patrolling these streets, this entire _city_, since I was ten, and you would not _believe_ the number of gang operations and drug deals I've stopped since then, let me tell y…"

"Whoa, calm down, Garfield!"

Beast Boy froze for a moment.

Robin was not entirely sure what happened next. One second, the green-skinned boy in front of him was frozen, the next second, Robin was on the ground, pinned to the pavement as a green leopard with very smelly breath leaned over him. Though the leopard couldn't talk, it was pretty obvious that it was not very happy, and that it wanted an explanation.

Robin swallowed. "Well. You've met Bruce Wayne, right?"

No answer. _Big freaking surprise_, Robin thought irritably.

"Of course you have. He asked you to move to Gotham as his charge and attend Gotham Academy, the top private high school in the city. Well. _He_ asked you as a student, and a citizen. Right now, I'm asking you too…" _Dramatic pause_, Robin thought. _Wait for it…_

The leopard growled. Obviously a "get on with it." Robin did, hurriedly.

"I'm asking you too, as a hero."

Beast Boy glared at Robin even more, if that was possible Robin was sure now that the leopard was glaring so hard his eyelids were completely closed, and wondered how he saw, what with his eyes being shut and everything.

"See… the local hero, Batman… you HAVE heard of HIM, right?" You could never be sure with some people. Robin had met a few people who had claimed to have _never_ heard of the Caped Crusader, ever. Strange world.

A nod. Actually, Garfield had admired Batman his whole life, and even dressed up as him on Halloween once.

"Well, the criminals are getting a little tough to handle. He wants me, his… sidekick…" Robin mumbled the last word. He _really_ hated the word "sidekick" and much preferred "protégé" or even "partner." He continued, "to lead a team of young supers. It'll give you, experience training, a chance to help people, and a good education from Gotham Academy all in one, Garfield." Robin placed slight emphasis on the "Garfield," to remind the leopard, still on top of him, that he did, after all, know his other identity, always a powerful persuasion tool with superheroes. "Err, what do you say?" he finished.

Beast Boy changed into human form long enough to shoot over his shoulder as he ran away, "I don't say _anything_," before growing wings and changing into a sparrow, flying off.

Robin was very irritated. Rubbing his head, which he had hit on the pavement as soon as that insane changeling tackled him, he sighed and started walking away.

---------------

Dick Grayson sighed, pushing back his last scrap of paperwork as though it were some kind of white, fine printed meal. He had tried his best to convince the changeling, but was unsure if he'd been successful. There was only one more superhero left to convince, and he hoped they could make a clean sweep for the whole team. But it was really up to the little green-skinned boy now. Of course, knowing his twin identities would certainly be a big help. Richard was fairly sure he'd come around, obnoxious though he'd been.

Who was the next girl again? Rachel someone. A minor practitioner of magic, it sounded like. Dick shivered. He'd never liked magic very much. Made him dizzy whenever he got too near it. Evidently she was a total ice queen too. Fantastic. A cold, unfeeling, probably emo witch was next on his list.

Ah well. There was no reason to worry over it. And he was sleepy. He turned off the lights, rigorously brushed his teeth (you couldn't have plaque near the Batman) applied a liberal dose of acne cream (he hadn't broken out yet, but again, Bruce was a little OCD about personal hygiene) put a spare costume and mask next to his bed (just in case) switched on his communicator (ditto) and, prebed rituals complete, collapsed onto the too-fluffy hotel bed and proceeded to sleep like a rock.

---------------

Gar thought very hard about Bruce Wayne's and Robin's offer and finally approached his foster parents with it. Over dinner (vegan spaghetti, delicious as usual) he cleared his throat and said, putting his utensils down, "I have a little announcement."

One of the things his foster family did was say important things over dinner, through "little announcements." It was a fairly tidy arrangement for Gar, since it meant that he never had to chicken out of saying something at any time other than dinnertime. His foster parents, Henry and Ella, laid down their utensils and finished chewing, waiting expectantly.

"A man approached me yesterday… um, he was Bruce Wayne." Henry's eyebrows rose almost off his forehead, but both his parents remained silent. "He made an offer to me. He says that I can go to Gotham and attend the top school there, Gotham Academy. I would be his legal charge and live in, um, his house, which is actually, you know, a mansion the size of, like, a small town and everything. So, I would be his legal charge… NOT his legal child or anything," he rushed out, seeing Ella's very outraged face. "I mean, I have the grades for it, and Mr. Wayne says he's watched me and a couple of other kids and decided we have potential… um, academically. He thinks I could be, um, a genetic engineer," he said. Mr. Wayne had mentioned something to that effect… "See, he's a billionaire and everything, so he's kind of philanthropist too. Evidently he does things like this a lot. Anyways… I thought it over… a lot, and I think it would be good for… my education." He paused. "You know, genetic engineering is something I'm really interested in. I think this would be really helpful," he added, hamming it up just a bit.

Good for his education maybe, but the real reason Gar thought he had to attend was that Robin knew both of his identities. He didn't like the prospect of having two of the most famous and powerful superheroes knowing something so important about himself. Those Batman and Robin types were manipulative bastards, nothing at all like the cool supers flitting along Gotham's rooftops that he'd envisioned. He still wasn't too sure where Bruce Wayne fit into all this, though. He was almost inclined to think it was a coincidence, but he knew that was unlikely.

Gar thought about all of this during the silence as his foster parents chewed it over, both the idea and their food.

After a moment, Henry spoke up. "Well. That's very exciting, Gar. I guess we'll, uh…" a glance over at Ella, "I guess we'll miss you."

"_Miss_ him?" Ella asked, looking a little angry. "What are you _talking_ about? We don't even _know _this man! For all we know, he could be some kind of sadistic child rapist! I _know_ just how unlikely that is!!" she added, at both Henry's and Gar's somewhat tired, and somewhat incredulous faces. "But you really can't be too careful. We can't just let Gar go to _Gotham_, one of the most dangerous cities in the _world,_ for high school, under the care of a man even he has barely met!"

"Excuse me," Gar said meekly. "It'll be in Gotham's suburbs. They're a lot… you know, better."

"Duly noted," Ella said, with a touch of sarcasm.

"Ella, it would be good for him."

"Excuse me again," Gar said, more meekly. Time to pull out the big guns. "Mr. Wayne will provide a full college scholarship, room, board, food, bills, and textbook money for _any_ college I get into." He was starting to use his doe-eyed "look" on his foster parents now. Gar was seriously worried now that this was not going to work out. "Mom, Dad, you know how much this means to me, right?"

Ella chewed her lip. Gar's college fund had been eating at their income for a while now, and though they were certainly not in poverty, they were not rich people. A _full _college grant for Gar was one of the most tempting things she'd ever heard.

After a couple of agonizing minutes, she spoke. "I want this in writing."

Gar ran over to hug both of his parents. "That's great! Thank you guys sooo much!!"

Inside he blew a sigh of relief.

---------------

Bruce Wayne accosted him again after school the next day. Gar told him his family could do it. Wayne smiled.

"Good. I'll be by on August 14th to pick you up… or else my butler, Alfred Pennyworth, will. Here's my card if you have any questions." Gar took the proffered piece of cardboard.

Wayne Enterprises

Bruce Wayne, CEO

Phone: 1-203-467-8900

"That's my business number. Here's my personal," Wayne said, writing a number on the back. And then he was gone, before Gar could say anything.

----------------

A/N: Please review! I love reviews. Reviews make me happy. And happy writers like to write. So, if you want to use some really good logic, if by any chance anyone wants me to continue, a review would be a GOOD thing. ^-^ I plan for this to possibly contain some pairings later… if there are any, it's going to be Rob/Star and BB/Rae. Romance isn't going to be the main focus of this story, though. I don't think. I kind of haven't written much of it yet… I have the next few chapters firmly written down though, so there will bean update by this time next week for sure. I promise.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: I said I would update quick. Thanks to everyone who reviewed for your kind comments. ^-^

---------------

**Chapter Two**

Yet another plane ride. Dick was starting to think he would become permanently jetlagged. Fortunately for him, Bruce Wayne's private jet had at least five extremely comfortable beds scattered around it. Dick collapsed on one of them and tried to sleep.

Rachel-girl lived in San Francisco. And San Francisco was _really_ far away from Chicago, near where Beast Boy lived. Dick got in almost five hours of napping on the way, but was still bleary-eyed when they landed. Anyway, at least this girl would be the last one. After that he could go back and…

He groaned. He realized that flying back home would involve going from _San Francisco_ all the way to _New York._ So much for his happy dreams of rest.

When they got off the plane, Bruce drove them over to their hotel. Dick rolled his eyes when he saw that Bruce had booked the most expensive suite in San Fran's Four Seasons. "The Four _Seasons?_" he asked. "Don't you think that's a little _extravagant_? We're staying for one _night_. I mean, even for you…" Bruce merely smirked. Dick rolled his eyes and stayed silent.

They got at the hotel at about eleven o'clock in the morning. After unpacking, Dick looked in Bruce's room and saw the man was fast asleep. Dick grinned and shook his head. At least _someone_ was feeling as sleepy as he was.

He started to look around the suite. In addition to two very luxurious bedrooms with attached bathrooms, the suite had a small kitchenette (no chance they'd use that) and a main sitting room between their two bedrooms, with a 72 inch plasma TV screen and a couch. Dick noticed that the bathrooms alone were about the size of most people's bedrooms. In fact, he was pretty sure there was enough room to _live_ in each of them. They were even bigger than the Manor's bathrooms. Probably because Bruce did not see the point of putting in a tub the size of a king bed _and_ a miniature steam room in _every_ bathroom in the house, he reflected.

After poking around in one of them for a while, Dick came back into the main room. Bruce had shaken himself awake and was sitting with his feet on the couch, flicking through the channels.

"What a crap TV," Bruce commented. "You can barely see anything on the screen." Dick stared for a moment at the crystal-clear, high-resolution HD screen, eyebrow raised, until he noticed, with no small measure of relief, that Bruce was joking. Bruce worried him sometimes. He really did.

---------------

Bruce left the suite at around one o'clock to go and intercept Rachel-witchy-girl at her school. Dick looked briefly through her file. Rachel Roth (alias Raven) was in possession of a fair chunk of magical artifacts, as well as having numerous magical powers. Oddly, there was absolutely no background on her origin, not even names of current parent/guardians. Dick raised an eyebrow, wondering how the school officials managed to not notice that this girl had no apparent legal guardians.

Raven-Rachel-person's powers were based on emotion, he noticed, perhaps doing something to explain why she was evidently so dark and quiet. In addition to many minor magical talents, Raven possessed the ability to do telekinesis and had a number of portal- and teleportation-related powers. Raven-girl seemed pretty dangerous, actually. Essentially, it seemed, the stronger her emotions, the stronger her powers, meaning if someone _really_ managed to get her angry, they were in for it. Dick fervently hoped they didn't ever come to blows, as he and Starfire almost had, back a few months ago… If they did, Dick had the distinct feeling that he might loose. And Richard Grayson did not like to lose. At all.

Dick realized he'd been looking through Raven's file longer than he thought when Bruce called him on his cell. Picking it up, he listened as Bruce explained what had happened when he approached Rachel with the suggestion of moving to Gotham.

"She didn't say a word the entire time," Bruce sighed over the phone. "I have absolutely no idea what she thinks of coming to Gotham. Considering that she lives by herself, though, the prospect of money and comfort might appeal to her. I don't know. She's kind of… stoic. She might not mind the whole living-on-the-streets thing she has going for her. I told her I'd be there again tomorrow, see what she thought. She seemed pretty thoughtful when I left. I don't know," Bruce said again. Dick could practically hear him running his hands through his hair over the phone line. It was a habit both of them shared. "I think you should probably go out at night and try to convince her."

"Any names?"

"I guess so. I mean, she doesn't really have any familial ties at all, so I don't think the whole normal superhero complex about her identity is going on with her. If we said we could expose her to her school and stick her with some overly cheerful, love-dovey parents, I think that would have more effect. I don't think she'd like those kind of parents. At all."

Judging from her file, Dick thought not too. "Thanks. I'll track her down on the streets tonight. Anything else?"

A slight pause as Bruce thought. "Nope. Not really."

"All right then. Bye."

"Yeah." Bruce clicked off his phone, and so did he. Dick still had a few hours before heading out on the streets. He managed to fill most of his time playing around with the massive bathroom's various functions. There was a waterproof phone in the power shower, he noticed. As if anyone would want to _call_ someone whilst _bathing_. Dick shook his head. Typical Bruce, to pick a suite like this. Actually, he thought with a grin, he wouldn't put it past someone like Bruce to find a use for a phone in a shower. Smirking, he opened the tap in the bathtub and filled it with steaming water, finally lowering himself into it and sitting there for almost an hour, becoming progressively more raisinlike. Finally, it was around eight-thirty, and the skies were starting to darken. Woozily, Dick climbed out of the bathtub, feeling a little dizzy from standing up after such a hot bath, and stumbled away, putting on his uniform. After an unsuccessful attempt to gel his too-wet hair, he finally sighed grumpily and headed out into the streets with a soaking wet head that made him chilly. He hoped he could get this over with quickly.

---------------

The Razors were a gang of thugs who ran around San Francisco dealing drugs and generally getting in trouble; in other words, they were a fairly average gang, no superpowered ringleaders, despite the relative commonness of such leaders in a city as big as San Fran. Raven was busy tracking down a group of them, when she felt that they were _very_ afraid. She started running faster to catch them, wondering what was going on.

When she reached their location, she found a _very_ squeaky-clean Robin standing next to them. Each thug was blindfolded and bound together with very strong-looking, shiny metallic cords. "Who are you?" Raven asked. She had a pretty good inkling, though, that this was probably Robin, Batman's sidekick, especially judging from the fact that he had a big old "R" on his chest and had a uniform identical to Robin's.

"I'm Robin. Batman's sidekick."

"Are you."

Robin was not altogether sure if Raven was asking a question. Usually, it was pretty easy to tell when people were asking a question, mainly because they had the helpful aid of _sounding_ like they were asking one. Raven, however, was merely looking at him, completely expressionless. "Um. Yeah."

"What are you doing here?" Okay, _that _one was _probably_ a question. Robin opened his mouth for the fourth time to explain.

"Well, okay. You met Bruce Wayne earlier today, right?"

"Yes."

"And he asked you to go to Gotham Academy. Didn't he?"

"Yes."

"Well. Crime in Gotham is on the rise."

"Is it really? Funny, I thought crime in Gotham might go _down_ one of these days."

Robin huffed slightly, blowing a soaked strand of hair out of his face. "And see, Batman and I thought we would put together a team of young superheroes. To protect Gotham. And we're asking you to be on it."

"Why?"

"Because you're a very powerful, um, magic user." Robin had no idea what she was called. Enchantress? Witch? Sorceress? Mage? He had a vague feeling that if he read more fantasy novels, he would know. As it was currently, however, he had managed to completely humiliate himself by using the phrase "um magic user." This was clearly evident in Raven's eloquently raised eyebrow.

"Anyway, in Gotham you'll get a full education and scholarship to any college you want to go to. And you'll be able to fight crime on a bigger scale, and do more good."

"Crime in San Francisco is actually pretty up there in terms of scale," Raven pointed out. "And I do a lot of good as it is."

Robin was very proud of himself, because he had actually prepared for this one. "That's true," he said smoothly. "But there are a lot of small time-heroes--and some more powerful ones, as well-- keeping the streets clean here. In Gotham, work like yours is really _needed_. _Heroes_ like you are needed. We-- it'd be really good if you could come, Rachel Roth."

Raven didn't flinch. "That name doesn't mean very much to me."

_Damn it_. "It doesn't matter. Raven, will you come? You won't have to live on the streets anymore, either."

Raven's face turned cold. "What makes you think I live on the streets?"

Batman impressed Robin. Whenever they were working together, he would frequently vanish as soon as Robin looked away. What impressed Robin more, however, was how after looking at Raven for at least five minutes straight, it could take him so long to realize she was gone. After almost fifteen seconds, he suddenly realized the girl who had been standing in front of him before was simply not there. How people did things like that, he'd never know. _Magic, I guess_, he thought, confused.

It was obviously going to be impossible to track Raven down. Actually, Robin thought he probably couldn't do much more to convince her anyway. Sighing, he used his grappling hook to propel himself to the nearest rooftop, and, bounding away as though he were back in Gotham, made himself back to the hotels roof, checking in after a few minutes, sans the costume. Bruce was waiting.

"Any luck?"

"No idea," Dick said shortly, sitting down on one of the beds and yawning. "I see what you mean when you say it's hard to tell what she thinks."

"Yeah." Dick thought maybe Bruce was a little disappointed. Normally, Bruce could tell exactly when a criminal or even random person he was examining was thinking. It was part of what made him such a good superhero. Raven, though, was a whole nother kettle of fish, Dick thought, remembering the completely expressionless face she'd had behind that hood. He wondered why Raven chose to stay so quiet. Even if her powers were based on emotion, it surely couldn't be so bad if she let loose once in a while, or even spoke using a normal tone of voice most of the time.

---------------

Rachel Roth was sitting under a tree and eating something while reading when Bruce came to see her. As he drew closer, he realized she was munching on a bag of chips. _Potato_ chips. Bruce was surprised, though he couldn't say just why.

Rachel turned a page in her book. She didn't acknowledge Bruce at all, but he had a feeling she knew he was there. "So, about yesterday… made up your mind yet?"

"Fine," was all she said, as she delicately put another salt-coated potato chip in her mouth. Bruce watched her chew, a little fascinated.

"Oh. Well, all right then. Here's my card. That's my business number," he said, for the fourth time. "Here's my personal." Another untidy scrawl, another Titan under their belts. Bruce smiled. "You'll do well in Gotham Academy. There are a lot of others with the same… precocious intellect that you have." Bruce smiled.

"Gee whiz." Rachel didn't even look at him.

Bruce's face fell, and he left with a sweep of his nonexistent cloak. He sighed inside. Sometimes he forgot he wasn't supposed to be Batman. Rachel raised an eyebrow at his motion, with her perpetually thoughtful face looking a little more cynical than usual.. Somewhat redfaced, Bruce left, walking with as much dignity as he could muster.

Sometimes it just wasn't as impressive when you weren't Batman.

---------------

A/N: Next: the plane rid to Gotham, the chapter where all the Titans will meet. And remember that reviews make people happy inside. ^-^


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Thanks again for comments, people.

titanfan45: Yeah. That part was really amusing to write, too. I had a lot of fun with it. I'm glad you liked it.

contagiouschristian: The pairings will end up being Beast BoyXRaven and RobinXStarfire, if anything. I've always liked BatmanXCatwoman as well, especially to add tensions to fight scenes, so I might throw a little of that in there as well. I'm not really sure how much romance there will be, though.

---------------

**Chapter Three**

---------------August 14th---------------

Bruce Wayne had a private 747. Gar was almost in awe as he handed his luggage to the smiling man next to him, mumbling a "thank you" as the man took the heavy bags without a flinch, and climbed on board the plane.

The inside of the plane was a spacious roughly cigar-shaped room complete with an enormous home theater system, a very shiny-looking computer, a set of bookshelves, several chairs, including two banks of regular airplane seats lining the walls, and, perhaps oddest of all, a snooker table. Most of the things were bolted to the floor in case of bad turbulence.

On the plane were two other boys and one girl. He wandered over to them. "Um, hi," he interjected.

"Hello, joyous friend!" the girl said, embracing him in a tight bear hug. Gar was faintly afraid for a few seconds that he would die. "I am Kori! It is glorious to meet you!" Gar thought he could hear muffled laughter as his normally somewhat pale face turned a handsome shade of purple.

Kori finally released him, smiling widely, to ask what his name was.

"G-Gar Logan."

"I am Kori!" Kori reiterated. "It is the shortened kind of addressement for Korina Anders. This is friend Victor!" Kori jumped up to hug a very tall, very strong looking black boy, who looked to be a little older than them. Victor wore a pair of dark sunglasses, and a hoodie with the hood up. Gar wondered faintly if he was trying to look punk; if he was, he was failing, he thought cynically. "And this is friend Richard!" This time the hug-victim was a boy with slick black hair and blue eyes, with a cherry-red t-shirt and jeans.

"P-pleased to meet you."

Kori beamed. "It is always such a joy to meet someone new! I believe the appropriate phrase is 'Oh happy day!'?"

"Um… definitely." Gar was confused. The giggling intensified.

"Come, joyous friend! Let us travel to the table of the game of snooker!" Kori literally dragged Gar to the snooker table. She was obviously stronger than she looked.

Gar found out that Kori was just as bad at snooker as he was, in that she had never even played and also did not know all of the rules. Gar wound up liking Kori immensely. Even though half the time he couldn't understand what she was saying, she had a bubbly (actually, bordering on frothy) personality that compensated for anything else. She was definitely fairly kooky in some respects, to be sure, but then again every interesting person Gar had ever met was pretty odd as well.

Gar learned that Kori was not a native English speaker (not surprising, and actually Gar expected it) and was originally from Africa like him (somewhat surprising, and interesting) In fact, her parents had supposedly been some sort of minor royalty in Niger, (extremely surprising, and actually a little outlandish, he thought) and were dead like his (surprising again, and a little sad) Her sister Con was acting as the head of the family in Niger, and Kori was being taken care of by a man named Guy Forde, here in the States. Gar was sure that underneath her effervescent exterior, Korina Anders was probably a less than happy person. She reminded him of someone he knew, actually.

The next few hours were uneventful, or as uneventful as spending a day on a billionaire's mile-high plaything could be. Gar discovered that the most likeable person on the plane was probably Vic Stone, a very muscular-looking, tall, thickset black boy. It turned out that both he and Gar shared many interests, ranging from video games to favorite sport teams, among others. Gar thought they were hitting off pretty well, actually. In reality, he had never really had many friends in middle school, so he would be able to make good on his chance to start with a fresh slate in Gotham City.

The plane stopped one more time in San Francisco to pick up one girl with pale grayish skin, who evidently wore violet contacts dyed her hair purple. There had been dozens of those girl in his old middle school; mostly they were the ones who took the normal mood swings of teenagers to mean that they should all get together and start making poorly-written, Poe-esque poetry. She looked and dressed those emo/goth girls and she was utterly silent the entire time, only sitting on one of the plane's seats and reading an ancient-looking leather-bound book. Gar steered clear from her. Girls like her didn't typically like to be around him. Not at all.

Dick, the other boy on the plane, said her name was Rachel Roth, and that was the end of that. Gar made no effort to find anything else out about her.

It wasn't long -- thirty minutes, tops -- after Rachel got on the plane that Dick asked them all to "gather round, please." Everyone did but Rachel, who merely turned a brittle, yellowed page in her book and kept reading. "Please." Dick's voice was emphatic.

Silently, Rachel closed the book, stood up, and dusted herself off, exuding cold dignity. She was so light on her toes, she almost seemed to float toward the group, where she hovered around the edge. Gar was thoroughly creeped.

"Well, there's no reason to keep pretending," Dick said.

Gar glanced at Victor, whose brow was furrowed with worry, and at Kori, who looked faintly confused for a moment. Then Kori's face lit up, and she smiled widely and glowingly, seeming to understand, and nodded.

Rachel Roth looked utterly blank, but Gar had a strong suspicion that Emogirl was never surprised by anything.

"Each of us are heroes," Dick said smoothly. "I'm Robin."

"Whhaaaaaaaattttttt???????" Gar was goggle-eyed.

"I'm Batman's protégé," he continued. "You--" --he pointed to Kori-- "--are Starfire." Kori smiled and nodded excitedly and seemed about to speak, but she was cut off by Dick's continuing voice. "Gar, you're Beast boy. Roth over there is Raven. And you--" --he gestured at Victor-- "--are Cyborg."

Gar was just noticing with satisfaction that Roth's unshakable confidence was definitely shaken, noticing even a faint line in her brow before she returned to blank, when Vic shook himself into action and ran at Richard-slash-Robin. Eeping, Kori took a few running steps and grabbed Vic's arm, finally managing to restrain him. "Please, friend, stop. This is not actually what it may appear." Grunting, she pulled on Vic. "Please stop struggling, friend Victor! Unrf-pleease," she groaned, tugging on him. Finally Victor stopped.

Rachel Roth spoke up. "Wait. You're Dick Grayson? And Dick Grayson is Robin?" Gar noticed Roth was even picking up normal speech patterns of placing emphasis on certain words. She was definitely surprised. Gar felt a little smug, for a reason he couldn't quite put his finger on.

"Well… yesss…" Dick replied, not sure where Roth was getting at.

"Well, that means that Batman is Bruce Wayne."

Robin groaned, planting his face in his hand. "Am I really that famous?"

"Front cover of last month's Teen Magazine," Kori supplied helpfully, whipping out a glossy-paged tabloid with colors that made Gar's head spin. Then the information sunk in, and his mouth dropped, before forming a hard line. His brow knitted together.

"WAAAIIIT. You mean I have met THE Batman and didn't even notice?" Vic exclaimed, previous rage forgotten.

"Yes," Dick replied tiredly. "Anyway, if you'd please let me continue with what I was saying…" he sighed, somewhat petulantly. "Crime in Gotham is once again hitting all-time highs, and the… uh… Bat-family… is having a hard time controlling it. And, actually, crime is going up all over the nation, you know, so Batman thought he would take matters into his own hands by personally training a bunch of young heroes like us. He hopes we can help protect Gotham -- during high school, at least. So, we're heroes, we're in high school in Gotham… we might as well help its people, right?" Dick was not actually so sure this was going to work out. Hell, Bruce was even cautious about taking him, Robin, along with him to fight some of the more dangerous criminal masterminds of Gotham. God knew, though, that supers (with powers, to boot) would probably be better off fighting the likes of the Joker and Scarecrow than innocent bystanders, but with Batman, the world was always divided between two kinds of people: himself and everyone else. Batman, of course, was utterly invincible; while everyone else couldn't lift a finger against a fly. Dick was pretty sure he and Babs were somewhere in between, probably closer to the innocent bystander side than he'd like. He sighed internally. Yet another worry to keep him up at night.

"So you're saying that this guy -- Bruce Wayne, of all people, shining philanthropist of Gotham-- blackmailed us into coming to Gotham so that we can fight in his little vendetta against the freak show there?" Gar asked, looking angry.

"Well, um, you gotta understand that it's not really quite like that…"

"Oh, I think it is," Gar cut in. "First you guys violate my privacy by figuring out what both my identities are, then you use them to essentially rip me away from my family, my school, my neighborhood, my beat, my life, by blackmailing me into coming to Gotham City, to be trained into one of Batman's sidekicks to help a couple of superheroes who obviously are not nearly as competent enough to… Wha… W… Just who do you think you are, exactly?" Gar finished, fists clenched. "Either you gotta have a very good reason to do this, or… or it isn't going to be pretty," he said finally, his teeth set on edge.

Dick ran a hand through his hair. He felt faintly annoyed by this thirteen-year-old boy -- who was he to think that he knew what was going on, anyway? -- even though he knew he should listen to what Gar had to say. He tried to make him feel better, by saying, "You don't understand. We need you." But as soon as he said it, he realized the skinny boy in front of him had a truly valid point.

Bruce had said they would use the young heroes' identities to "help persuade" them, something that seemed perfectly reasonable at the time. But now that he really thought about it, he was starting to think a little differently.

"Vigilantes live in a permanent gray area, Richard," Batman had said when he was eight years old, shortly after Dick had been adopted. "You've got to be able to bend some of the rules. It doesn't matter what the others think. As long as you do what's right for the people." Dick hadn't really understood then, being eight years old, but now he thought he had an idea of what he had been saying…

Coming back into reality, he spoke. "You mean you aren't happy about the school, the life, the college money?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

"That has nothing to do with it. Heroes like you are supposed to protect people's rights. Why are we any different? I'm not-- we're not animals, you know."

Dick almost felt like apologizing, but he shut his mouth tightly, realizing that that would make a very bad impression on the team he was supposed to lead, after all. "Don't we all live in… a gray area?" he asked, borrowing words from his mentor. "We're single people… single heroes. Our very existence is illegal. You all know how it is, I know. We do what we have to do for the good of those we protect. Whatever it takes." He didn't say anything else. Gar didn't look very satisfied, but he didn't reply. It was better than nothing, Dick supposed. At least he had managed to avoid stuttering like a fool.

Dick was becoming increasingly uncertain that this whole leading-a-bunch-of-teenaged-superheroes thing was a wise idea. He sighed once more, running his hand through his now-disheveled hair. "How is this going to work out?" he muttered, sighing.

---------------

A/N again: Coming next: the Titans finish their plane ride. Excitement abounds. I know this is supposed to be Action/Adventure. I promise to put in a fight scene soon, m'kay?

I know the BB/Rae pairing may seem a little unlikely in this chapter, but I don't think Raven would be exactly warm and friendly to Beast Boy when they first met. And I also wanted to keep Gar's perception of Rachel fairly realistic. A lot of people's relationships are going to change throughout this fic. These are just… y'know, first impressions. ^-^

Another thing: As I continue to write this, I am coming increasingly to grips with a very important realization: This fanfic is going to be REALLY LOOONG. So brace yourself for a long ride, people. Like, dozens of chapters long. I'm serious. I hope I can keep it interesting enough for you people. ^-^


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Thank you all again for your support and other niceness. ^-^ I worked pretty hard trying to keep the personalities accurate… I'm glad you all enjoyed it.

titanfan45: A snooker table is a game that you play snooker on. Since that probably isn't very helpful, snooker is a game that's a lot like pool. It's played with basically the same kind of balls and cue ball as regular pool, as well as that little pokey cue that you use in pool/billiards. If you win a certain number of points, you win a frame (or an individual game). The person with the most won frames wins. Except, Gar and Kori would probably just play it by trying to put the balls in the pockets, since they didn't really have much of a idea how to play. XD.

---------------

Gar and Vic Stone were sitting next to each other for most of the rest of the plane ride. They had been chatting animatedly for almost an hour, when Gar changed the subject.

"_So, __Dick_ over there," Gar said. Victor laughed at the emphasis. "He said you were called Cyborg. And, um, unless I'm completely wrong, which is always, you know, a possibility, a cyborg is a robot. Which would mean…" he trailed off. Gar had been trying for the past hour for the two of them to become more relaxed, before he did any stupid unwarranted probing into Victor's life.

Vic sighed, and took off the pair of large, dark sunglasses he had been wearing.

"Oh," Gar said, as he realized Vic's left eye was glowing a faint red. Victor lowered the hood of his sweatshirt, which had been hiding his face, and Gar saw an armor-like plating of wires and metal on most of the left side of Vic's face, made of shiny metal that gleamed in the plane's light. "Never mind, then. That explains it!" he said cheerfully. Vic looked a little surprised.

"What do you mean 'never mind?'" he asked, seeming confused. "Aren't you…?"

As soon as he realized what Vic was saying, Gar started laughing. "No! What do I care if you have a couple of prosthetics or whatever? Actually, to tell you the truth, I'm not technically a human being. My DNA… it isn't _Homo sapiens_. Not usually, at least. See, watch." Gar stood up and reached down to his finger, before slowly twisting a dial on a ring, located where a gem might normally be inset in the metal.

Vic watched as the image of Gar, blond-haired and jade-eyed, flickered before him. Finally, he heard the dial click, and Gar solidified again, looking like a completely different person. Gar had razor teeth, catlike pupils, pointed ears, and claws for fingernails. And most of all, he was _green_. His skin was green, his hair was green, his eyes were green. Framing his face was a faint growth of thin, stubbly green hair, traveling down to his neck, where it disappeared into his shirt. Then Vic noticed a faint twitching in the corner of his eye, and he look down and realized something else: Gar Logan had a thick, fluffy, almost squirrelike tail. Gar grinned, baring his sharpened, elongated canine teeth. "Pretty nasty, huh? Especially the baby-beard. I can never shave this thing off," he said irritably, scratching his chin. "And it itches like fury. Here, watch. I change into animals," he said, before rapidly shifting, snake-cat-bear-wolf-falcon-spider-rat-lizard-sparrow, before he finally changed into a chirping velociraptor, peering intently at Vic, looking a lot like in the movies. As an afterthought, he switched to an enormous phoenix, blazing flames for a brief instant, before returning to his human form, looking slightly winded. "They don't have to be… you know, real animals. Or even not extinct. But the bigger they are, or if they aren't real, or they've died out… well, it really tires me out. So, you know, I try not to." Gar rapidly twisted the dial again. "I like my regular skin better, he said, looking a little embarrassed behind his pale-skinned façade. "But I can still feel my tail… and that damn itchy chin hair," he added, looking irritated again. He scratched his chin viciously. "That's better," he said, grinning. "So you see, I know where you're coming from. Actually, I think most of us do. So I… we… we understand what your… issues are."

"Yeah… um, actually, most of me is metal," Vic admitted. "Mostly, you know, I wear dark sunglasses. And hats. A lot of hats. Yep! Hats are good." He rubbed the back of his neck, embarrassed. Gar saw his fingers were tipped with metal. He could see how much Vic hated the way he was, and his gut clenched in sympathy.

"Why don't you just use a holoring like me?" Gar inquired after a short silence.

"Actually, um, I didn't really know they… existed." Vic looked a little embarrassed again. Gar's eyebrows shot up.

"Are you kidding? Almost all metas have them…" Gar said. "I mean, all the… non… regular-looking ones, at least."

"Metas?"

"Metahumans," Gar explained. This was really odd. He had never really met anyone "special" like him who knew so little about the metahuman community, superhero and otherwise. "Usually the people in the… meta community track you down and help you out. Or that's what they did with me, after my little… accident."

Vic looked a little surprised at the sound of this. "…I've only really been like this for six months," he admitted at last. "I'm not even much of a hero. I just fought a couple of bullies on the streets before, you know? I've only been half-metal for about six months. It's why I'm still only going to be a freshman, even though I'm fifteen. Honestly, I don't even know why these guys picked me to be on this little… thing. I mean… hey, um… can we please talk about possibly something else?" he asked, looking a little uncomfortable. Gar understood immediately, and segwayed the conversation smoothly into the subject of Packers football. Vic looked a little relieved.

---------------

Kori Anders had ended up sitting nest to Rachel. Rachel had been sitting in the same seat for the entire plane ride, except for Dick's little meeting. Kori had decided to sit next to Rachel after the meeting, mostly because she had not had much of a chance to speak with her before.

Rachel had put the dusty old book down in her lap, and was sitting very straight in her seat, with her head tilted back ever so slightly and her eyes closed tight. Inside she was thinking of nothing other than the hopeful wish that this bubbly girl would refrain from speaking to her and leave her much-valued privacy intact. Truth be told, Rachel was not exactly like Kori, in basically any way, and she was positive that they would not exactly hit off if they came to the point where they actually exchanged words with one another. The last thing she needed right now was a side helping of idle gossip.

After nearly ten solid minutes of blessed silence, wherein she expected Kori to speak up any second, Rachel cracked open one eye and peered at Kori. "Aren't you going to start talking to me about clothes or boys?" she asked. Despite the slight bitterness in her voice, Kori was surprised by the lack of maliciousness in it.

"Nooooo…" she trailed off, a little confused.

Another few minutes of silence, as Rachel waited for Kori to finish her undoubtedly clear and succinct point about the latest trends in skirts, or whatever people like her talked about. "Oh," Rachel finally said after a while, at a loss.

"Kori, I can usually tell a lot about people," Rachel finally said, her voice hard. "One of my powers is empathy. Most girls like you are the girls that sit next to me at lunch and try to make friendly conversation with me because they feel sorry for the dark little silent girl sitting by herself. Those people always give up eventually, no matter how determined they are initially. I can tell you're going to try that as well. I thought I would warn you in advance to _please leave me alone_." Rachel felt bad about saying this before Kori had technically said anything to her, but she could feel Kori's personality, and thought it only fair to give her a warning.

"Um… okay…" Kori agreed slowly.

Neither of them said anything else the entire plane ride, though Rachel was certain Kori was pretty bored, particularly toward the end. Privately, though, she was impressed.

---------------

Dick had gone into the cockpit, where Alfred was piloting the plane. "Shouldn't you have a copilot?" he inquired, raising an eyebrow.

Alfred glanced at him. "You know this plane has been designed to be piloted solo, Master Dick."

"This plane has been designed for a _couple_ of things, actually," Dick said absentmindedly, running his finger along a patch of smooth metal, thinking of the heat-seeking missiles and liquid-nitrogen-filled bombs that Bruce had installed personally, "just in case." Alfred merely smirked.

"Yes. It has." Dick sat down in the softly padded copilot's seat and sat with his chin rested on his hand, thinking. After another few minutes of flying in silence, Alfred spoke again. "I thought as a team leader, you might want to be… bonding with your team, sir."

Dick blew out a frustrated breath. "I don't really think my team likes me, Alfred. I know at least one-fourth of it doesn't."

Alfred looked at him again. "Perhaps you and Master Bruce shouldn't have taken advantage of them so readily, sir. I do hate to say it, but I did rather warn you." Dick was slightly stung. "At any rate, you might want to try to get on better terms with your teammates, sir," Alfred continued. "You young ones can't let any hot-headedness endanger your unity, you know, Master Dick. Your lives are going to be in each other's hands. If there's ever the slightest hesitation in your trust, your lives… and the lives of others… could be destroyed. Sir."

Dick's finger slowly traced its way along a readout screen. "I know."

Alfred raised one of his ever-expressive eyebrows. "As you say, sir," he said, inclining his head.

Dick cast a sidelong glance at him. "What are you telling me, Alfred?"

"Whatever you take it as, Master Dick." Dick sighed. "You may want to go and reconcile relations with your team, sir. That _was_ the main purpose of this plane ride, you know."

Dick nearly pouted. "I don't have anyone to sit with," he said. "Either I sit next to the changeling boy who loathes me, or I sit next to _girls_. _Two_ of them," he added for emphasis, looking embarrassed. "And I can't sit by myself," he added, seeing Alfred's expression. "I'm supposed to _lead_ them, for God's sake."

"I wasn't going to say that, sir," Alfred said, holding back a chuckle. Dick raised a questioning eyebrow. "I was going to say you weren't going to get cooties from the girls." Dick's face turned a bright red, matching his t-shirt. Alfred smiled widely.

"Alfred… Alfred, just please shut up. Thank you very much." Dick buried his face in his hands.

Alfred smirked. "As you say, Master Dick. But that being said, it wouldn't hurt you to just go and speak with them."

Dick sighed again, making a face and running a hand through his tousled hair. "I don't know how to make him hate me less. Garfield said that he was… sort of angry… that we had… you know, blackmailed him and all." Dick thought about how hard it had been for Batman to give up both of their secret identities to the others, yet how easily he had decided to find out and use the others' against them. "You know, Alfred, I think Bruce may be a hypocrite. He's always so careful to safeguard his family's secrets, but he was so eager to dig up my team's backstories and invade their privacy for information… and use it against them to help us, if necessary." Dick thought of another thing. "And Catwoman -- Selina Kyle -- he'd trust his name with a dangerous free agent like her, just for -- you know." Dick's face, which had just recovered from its most recent bout of blushing, turned bright red again. Alfred smirked once more.

"Master Dick, you must not be as sharp as I'd thought if you're only now noticing that," he said. "Master Bruce is not the most morally astute of men, hero though he is. He _is_ a vigilante, and exacts his own kind of justice, to the people he deems appropriate. That doesn't make him a moral pillar of society, no more than any other man."

Dick thought of the Barbie doll girl -- or six -- that Bruce always had around his arm. "You know, Alfred, I really think you're right." Dick sighed. "I guess he was just doing what's needed to help Gotham."

"What's needed to help Gotham isn't always what's best for everyone else," Alfred pointed out. "Master Dick, sir, don't you think you _should _go and try to resolve things with your new team? Before they get any worse. First impressions and all that."

"Well… I guess so," Dick agreed. He got up, stretching, and left. He only hoped he could make relations better with Garfield Logan.

---------------

Rachel was starting to become very impressed with Korina Anders. She could feel that Kori was still as bursting with enthusiasm as ever, but she somehow managed to keep it contained, something that was probably very difficult for a person like her, who always seemed to be on an endorphin surge mixed with a sugar rush, she thought cynically. Kori, however, still managed to keep a very tight lid on her excitement, seeming to not wish to irritate Rachel. Rachel had even gained enough courage to reopen her book, and, hoping Kori would not inquire as to its contents, started reading. Kori started twiddling her thumbs and concentrated very hard on not making Rachel angry.

Rachel saw Dick come out of the cockpit back into the cabin. Since there was only a double row of seats along the plane's walls, Dick sat behind Garfield and Victor and leaned forward. He was evidently trying to talk with them. Rachel rolled her eyes slightly. _Good luck with _that, she thought. She could feel how unreceptive Gar was to him.

It was another few, fairly uneventful hours later when their pilot's voice rang out through the cabin. "Ladies and gentlemen, I must request that you please fasten your seat belts. We are beginning to descend, and will land in Gotham in around thirty minutes. Rachel sighed with anticipation, feeling her legs, which were starting to cramp, give a cry of relief. They had been flying non-stop from San Francisco International Airport to what was presumably Bruce Wayne's private airstrip. She was very sick of sitting in one spot for so long. From the looks on the others' faces, they were as well.

During the next half hour, Rachel could see increasingly fine details on the ground, and, at last, could feel the judder of the plane as it started to land, then eased into a stop. "We've arrived, everyone," their pilot said, somewhat unnecessarily. "We'll be getting off the plane in a few minutes. Please remember to take anything you may have brought on the plane with you. I'll be getting your luggage as we leave."

Everyone got up eagerly and stretched. "It was good to meet you, Rachel," Kori said sincerely. Rachel felt like raising an eyebrow, but refrained from doing so.

Their pilot, a very well-trimmed, somewhat aged-looking man, handed each of them their luggage one by one, introducing himself to each of them. When he got to Rachel, he handed her her bags and bowed. "I am Alfred Pennyworth, ma'am. I am Bruce Wayne's butler and… confidant." Rachel got a strong feeling that Alfred Pennyworth knew about Bruce Wayne's double life -- besides, it would be difficult to hide the fact that he left every night to parade around as a costumed bat from the man who made his bed every morning. "Thank you, Alfred," she said, inclining her head and taking her luggage from the butler's hands.

In single file, they left the plane, with Alfred bringing up the rear. Rachel noticed he was carrying his own luggage, and was bent over slightly with the weight of it. Her brow creased into a concerned line. "Hey," she said, her eyes glowing white for a moment. A flick of her wrist and Alfred's bags were hovering in the air next to her. "Need a hand?"

Though he looked a little surprised for a moment, Alfred eventually smiled at her. "I can carry my own bags, Miss Rachel. But thank you," he added, bowing slightly.

"No problem." Rachel said, holding back a smile.


	5. Chapter 5

A.N: Yeah, I hope no one minds that I'm messing with all the character's appearances. I never really liked the spandex look most superheroes have, it just seems unrealistic that they wouldn't wear some sort of armor-type Kevlar thing. You'll see I'm going to change some of the costumes around as well.

And that's just my personal version of Beast Boy… with some more furry-animal things and so forth. I always thought it would be interesting if Beast Boy looked more… beastly. Anyway, on with the story. ^-^

Also, sorry for the comparatively long update time. I've had a lot of post-midterm projects to do for high school, for some reason. 0.o. Kind of weird, actually. Right now I'm actually supposed to be working on a children's book about Shintoism. But writing this is more fun. :D

---------------

**Chapter Five**

Bruce Wayne's airstrip was not exactly located close to his actual house. While the airstrip was still on his estate technically, the Wayne estate definitely encompassed a _very_ large area. In fact, they all clamored into a limousine (that Gar described as "pimpin") and drove for twenty minutes through a very wandering road that did not seem headed in a particular direction. Eventually they passed through a ten-foot high wrought-iron fence that surrounded Wayne Manor.

The Manor was very large. Gar supposed he expected this, considering that Bruce Wayne was one of the richest men in the world and all, but he was still in awe of the man's wealth. Wayne Manor was at least five stories high, and stretched away for what looked like miles to Gar.

There was a thin path stretching up to the Manor, which they followed to the front door, then entered into the manor's foyer, which was filled with dark red carpet and expensive-looking art, leading up to a dark mahogany staircase. Hanging from the ceiling was a large chandelier. It looked to Gar like it was made completely of very fine quartz, with a couple of equally fine diamonds thrown in for no apparent reason. Gar realized as he looked around the room that there were a few artfully hidden security measures as well, ranging from cameras set in the walls to what he thought might be a tranquilizer gun hidden in the chandelier.

They all put their luggage down for a few seconds, massaging their arms, and then Alfred spoke up. "Master Bruce is away for the moment," he said, "so I shall show you around. Right now you probably want to know where you're sleeping. As a matter of fact, Wayne Manor has at least a dozen extra bedrooms, which you can choose from on your own. Please follow me, I'll show you them."

The first room they came to was one on the top floor with an enormous bay window looking out over the woods on Wayne's estate. "I want this one," was the first thing Rachel said, before setting her luggage down in an extremely final manner, looking around for a while as though she dared anyone else to claim the room. No one did. Gar wondered faintly if Rachel was clinically paranoid.

Most of the other rooms were similar to the one Rachel had picked. Eventually they all claimed a room for themselves and started unpacking their luggage. Gar and Vic picked rooms almost directly across from one another, and as he explored both their rooms, he realized that there was a very, very fast, powerful computer in each of them. Vic almost started drooling as soon as he saw them, and ran after Alfred, before spouting out a stream of technical gibberish that Gar could not hope to understand. Vic's face grew increasingly joyful with every reply Alfred made, and Gar realized something and tried unsuccessfully to stifle a snort.

"Dude, you should see your face," he snorted. "You look like you're going to hump the computer." He started laughing hysterically. Victor laughed a little in spite of himself, though his face was turning bright red. Gar noticed that Alfred somehow managed to look completely collected, though there was something of a twinkle glittering in his eyes.

"Hey!" Vic cried. "Xertic Corp.'s computers are the highest quality comps in the _world_!" Gar only laughed harder.

"_Highest quality_, huh? They must be some pretty nice _computers_, then," he smirked, waggling his eyebrows at each emphasis. Gar had discovered that if you said almost anything in a certain tone of voice, you could usually either make people almost asphyxiate from laughter or almost die of embarrassment, depending on who it was directed at. Victor's dark skin was turning a curiously bright scarlet, and he was definitely not laughing. Gar grinned widely. "Vic," he said, "I think you need to learn to laugh at yourself. C'mon man, lighten up. Everyone has a couple of weird fetishes, you know," he said, waggling once more. "Just open up to me, man. We'll learn how to deal with it. Together," he sniffed, wiping a imaginary tear from his eye, still laughing.

"Shut up," Victor groaned, though he was keeping back a smile as he did.

---------------

Later, Alfred tracked them all down, for dinner. At only about five thirty, they all sat down at the table and started eating. Alfred explained. "Supper is usually about this early, thanks to Master Bruce's… nocturnal habits. Breakfast on school days is at six thirty, and on weekends, lunch at noon, with breakfast at eight o'clock. If you come much later than these times, I'm afraid you'll have to run the risk of eating leftovers. Of course, I'm always happy to cook individual servings as well, so if you have too much homework or some such to come and eat, don't fret. Master Bruce should be around here soon, he'll explain more about training and patrols to all of you. If you ever need me, I'm usually on the ground floor, near the kitchen. Any further questions?" he asked. Looking around, he realized there were none. "That's good. Please make yourselves at home, everyone." And then he started walking away.

"Wait!" Gar cried. "Where are you going? Aren't you going to eat?"

"I don't eat at the table, Master Garfield. It's not really my place."

"Yes, you do, Alfred," Dick said cheerily. "Come on. You sit with the family all the time. And this is our family now, too." (Gar raised an eyebrow, but said nothing.) "Please sit with us," he said, with an edge of insistence.

"Very well, then, Master Dick," Alfred said, sighing slightly. But Gar saw he was smiling. Alfred was definitely strange. Probably almost as strange as the rest of them.

---------------

Bruce Wayne arrived just as his plate of food was right on the cusp of becoming cold. He sat down and started eating it with a speed that rivaled Victor's, which was definitely very fast. Once they were all done, Dick cleared his throat and spoke up.

"Um… I thought it would be good for us all to introduce ourselves a little bit more. Most of us don't really know each other… basically at all. And any introductions we may have made on the plane may have been… you know, a complete bundle of, um, lies and everything…" He trailed off. He wasn't sure he liked where this was going. But, no stopping now. "So, uh, does anyone really want to go first or anyth…" He was cut off by Kori, who leapt out of her seat and started talking rapidly.

"I am Kori'andr. It means, in your language, Star Fire, and that is also my other name, the one that I shall use on Gotham's streets. I told many of you that my parents are royalty in Africa -- sadly, that is a lie. It is part of my identity that is a secret from all others, correct?" She looked around eagerly. Rachel gave a dull, tired nod. "I am, in truth, from Tamaran. It is, as you would say, an extraterrestrial land… meaning I am not from this earth." Kori cast a slightly worried glance around the room, as though she was concerned that the others would not find this acceptable. "I came here on a spaceship… that was taking me to the Citadel." Kori started deflating slightly, and a shadow seemed to pass over her eyes. Garfield had no idea what, who, or where the Citadel might have been, but he had a feeling that it/they were some pretty bad boys. He wondered what had gone on there, and if he really wanted to know. "However, I managed to perform what you would call a most daring escape. The first person I met was Richard, known as the Robin."

"Uh, just Robin, Kor. Actually, I think we've been over this," Dick said.

"Oh. Forgive me. Well, he convinced me to help him and the Batman here in Gotham. I am looking forward to being able to help the people of Gotham and explore the many different cultures of this world. And that, I think, is the topsoil covering my posterior!"

"Background?" Rachel inquired drily, after a significant pause as the others tried to figure out what Kori was saying.

"Yes. That is the word for it." Another significant pause. Gar was thinking they would spend more time being uncomfortably silent than actually speaking to one another.

"Um, does anyone want to… go next?" Richard's voice broke out in the silence.

"No," Gar said, looking grumpy. Victor kept his mouth closed as well, out of deference to Gar. Vic wasn't sure Gar really liked Dick, or that Gar would be happy at all if he volunteered to do what he said.

"All right," Rachel finally said. "I'm Raven. I go by Rachel Roth because the name Raven raises a couple of eyebrows… not a good thing for a secret identity. I'm an empath with telekinesis and minor healing powers. I also dabble in… other magic. I protect people, like you do. That's it. All you need to know." She closed her mouth in a very final manner, looking around with that same daring way she had when she claimed her room. No one said anything.

"What about your, erm… background, correct?" Kori inquired.

"No."

_What a forthcoming team_, Dick thought sarcastically. _We'd all trust each other with our lives, I'm sure. Fantastic._ He groaned inwardly.

"I'm Richard Grayson," he said finally. "I go by Dick. Be quiet," he snapped, glaring at Bruce, who was cracking a smile and chuckling under his breath.

"I didn't say _anything_," Bruce said defensively. Dick rolled his eyes.

"Good." He continued. "Bruce adopted me." He was going to leave it at that, but he realized that then he would have been even less forthcoming than the rest of his team. _Way to build trust, Robin,_ he thought sarcastically. "I… I used to be in the circus. And then my parents died… in an accident. It was caused by a mob boss the circus had pissed off. Bruce adopted me later. And he started training me to be Robin. That's where I am today, now. I don't really have any powers. I mean, I'm very acrobatic, obviously… well, okay, I'm probably one of the best acrobats on the planet, even including most of the Justice League… and I'm pretty smart… I mean, well, technically I'm a genius, but, you know." Rachel raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, Richard, you're really just a regular old Joe-Shmoe, aren't you?" Dick started blushing furiously. Rachel thought he had a pretty fragile ego. She got the feeling that the Dark Knight could probably do that to people.

"That's about it," Dick muttered, rubbing the back of his neck. _Yep, definitely fragile ego._ "Um, Gar, Vic, will one of you please go next?" Gar crossed his arms over his chest, sticking out one his chin and one of his teeth in a mulish manner. "I mean, I'm sorry about what we've done. But you're here now, with us, and you've got to put it behind you. It's your job to protect people, and Gotham really _needs _protecting. We need to know a little bit about one another. Please, Gar. Or, you, know, Vic could go next, too. That'd work."

Finally Victor started speaking, with a slightly apologetic glance at Gar. "I'm Vic Stone. I… uh, I had an accident. Now most of me is made of metal." He stopped, falling silent.

"…And will _you_ do the uncovering of the ground on your posterior?" Kori asked hopefully.

"Um, sorry. No can do," Vic said, looking slightly pained at the thought. _Yep. Definitely a forthcoming team. We've got some work to do,_ Dick thought."Gar? It's you next," Vic said, poking his new friend in the shoulder.

"Fine. I'm Garfield Logan. I got real sick once. They fixed me, but now I change into animals. And my skin's green."

There was even more silence. "Obviously," Rachel finally chimed in. "I can definitely see the viridian tints."

Gar turned red. "Well, not _now,_" he muttered. "I have a holoring. It makes me… not as green." Rachel raised an eyebrow. Gar wished she would stop. "You know, I really wish you would stop," he said finally, unable to think of a comeback. Rachel said nothing. "So, um… hey, are you going to be part of our lovely little bonding session?" he asked to change the subject, gesturing at Bruce.

"No."

Another pause. "Oooo-kay then!" said Gar, looking miffed. "You know, I really think you should bond with us too. It's not fair that we have to rip our pasts out of our souls and set them on the table and you don't, you know," he said sarcastically. Bruce shot him what Dick knew was a patented Batman Ice-Cold Laser-Beam Death Glare of Doom. Gar winced.

"Well, we aren't really going to be strictly working with Batman very much," Dick explained. "I mean, I might, but I'm his sidekick. He's just going to train us all. I mean, we can't really spread out and protect Gotham if we're in one big Bat-Family group."

"Yes," Bruce agreed. "When you're in the field, you aren't necessarily going to have my benevolent protection. Keep that in mind."

"What a rip-off," Gar muttered to Vic. "I've idolized this guy almost my entire life, and when I actually come here, I find out that I'm not even going to be near him on the streets." Vic nodded silently. Gar got the feeling Bruce had heard him, and busied himself with staring at his plate and eating his piece of chocolate cake. He didn't know why, but Bruce Wayne scared him.

When they were done, Bruce addressed them as a group. "Since most of our work is done at night, and school is in the daytime, I have a couple of rules. Try to get back in the house by midnight or one. You have to get up at 6:30 for breakfast and school. I don't recommend skipping breakfast with all the work you'll be doing. And I definitely don't want to deal with a bunch of school officials poking into my life and bothering me about how you keep falling asleep in class, or pass out from hunger pangs, or something. If you really need sleep, I'd suggest a post-school nap or something.

"Another thing. Do all your homework. I am perfectly serious," he said, growling slightly, looking at Dick's smirk and raised eyebrow. "With my experience in the school system, as long as you do all your homework and study occasionally, a reasonably bright person can easily get their Harvard A and a little gold star. If you're at all concerned about college, you should do this anyway. Again, I don't want anyone thinking I'm some sort of bad father with delinquent children." Bruce's voice was gruff, but Gar thought there was some element of… something… besides worrying about public inspection. Then again, he could definitely be wrong.

"Lastly. Training. During this break, we'll train from eight A.M. until eleven o'clock, and then again from two until four. After the start of school, you should be better-conditioned, so we'll only train for an hour, from four-thirty until five-thirty. The rest of your conditioning will come in the field. When we're training, we meet in a sort of gym room designed just for training, on the first floor. We'll practice in whatever costumes we fight in. A woman, Jodi Newson, will come in the day after tomorrow and try to get what you wear on the streets up to Gotham level. I imagine whatever you wear _isn't_ made of triple-weave Kevlar with nano-carbon fibers or anything," Bruce said dryly. "Dick said certainly not, anyway." Gar grimaced at the thought of his own biking-shirt black spandex and jeans… his hero getup was actually rather lame, he reflected. And certainly _not_ bulletproof. Actually, he reflected, Forston was nothing like Gotham. There certainly weren't any insane supervillians or anything in Forston. Really, there were only a few drug dealers on the streets, the occasional gangster in over their heads… nothing at all like the massive organized crime clans or lunatic powerhouses of Gotham. Gar honestly wasn't sure he would _survive_ on Gotham's streets with a biking shirt and jeans. God knew how many ordinary people hadn't.

"We'll train tomorrow morning at eight. Just wear gym clothes and athletic shoes, if you have them. I assume you four are bright enough to know _not_ to be late. Dick, you already know this." Dick nodded grimly. Gar sighed. So, he got to live in a billionaire playboy's mansion, but he _still_ had to get up early. What a sad, sad state of affairs. Hopefully training in the morning would be interesting, at least.

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A.N: I promise there will be fighting in some form in the next chapter. This must be getting pretty boring right now. T.T But I promise it's very important to introduce everyone. Have a nice day, thanks for reading, reviews always boost my fragile ego, etc. Ta ta.

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	6. Chapter 6

A.N: Hey, guys! Sorry for the update time -- I've been caught in that big snowstorm that's been on the news lately. I've pretty much been trapped in my house without power for the past week, though I am much better now, thank you. ^-^

wawaboy2: Hahaha. Yeah, I had a fun time seeing just how little information I could reveal about everyone's past. It was quite the emotional rollercoster, I think. Hope none of you needed _too_ much Kleenex. ;)

Everyone else (sorry, I guess I just snubbed you :P): Thanks, thanks, thank you very much, thank you, and thanks again. ^-^

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**Chapter Six**

Gar's alarm went off at precisely 7:57 and, the earliest possible time he could think of for getting downstairs at 8:00. With a kind of practiced ease that came from long pre-school experience, he wriggled into gym shorts and a shirt, jammed his toes into a pair of running shoes (he could always tie them later, he reasoned, if he really had to) and started running downstairs, shifting into a green-spotted cheetah for speed, before calmly opening a steel-coated door in the basement, helpfully labeled GYM. With a sinking feeling, he saw that a digital clock conveniently located on the wall read 8:01. Rachel raised an eyebrow. Gar made a face. He would need to work on his speed-dressing. He had gotten out of practice over the summer.

The gym was covered in metal -- steel, or some steel alloy, by the smell of it. The floor and all the walls were a uniformly dull gunmetal-gray color. Gar wondered faintly if Batman was colorblind. The ceiling was very high up, and a complicated network of rafters and pipelines started about fifteen feet above his head. The entire room resembled an abandoned warehouse, not some kind of high-tech training facility that he expected from one of the most badassed heroes in the world AND possibly the richest man in the country.

He looked around the room to see Rachel's eyebrow was _still_ located somewhere near her hairline."Stop looking at me like that," he finally snapped. "Jeez. I was only like a minute late." Rachel's eyebrow lowered, but she was still looking at him in that infuriating sarcastic way that she seemed to have and... "I _know_ he said not to be late! And I'm not even the one who's _really_ late. Batman and the Boy Wonder aren't even here yet! Ow!" he cried. In an instant, a mass of metallic-looking cables had crashed into him from somewhere in the ceiling, binding him to the wall. Kori giggled slightly.

"Wanna bet?" asked Dick, dropping from the rafter-maze on the cieling. He was wearing his retarded little retarded-kid Colorful Spandex of Retardation, as Gar had creatively dubbed his costume. Gar could faintly detect the smell of drying sweat on it, and made a face. Dick had obviously been here for a while, possibly an hour. So much for his whole Dick-Grayson-is-at-least-as-lazy-as-a-normal-teenager-and-enjoys-sleep-as-much-as-aforementioned-teenagers theory, he thought. Kori giggled some more. Anyway, at least Batman wasn't going to be chewing him out. He had heard that that man could be _scary_ sometimes...

There was an almost noiseless thump as someone else landed on the dirty-warehouse floor. Not surprisingly, considering his luck, Gar saw that it was Bruce Wayne in full Batman regalia. "I told you to come at eight o'clock. It isn't that early, Garfield." Gar begged to differ, but stayed silent. "I even told you specifically not to be late. _Don't do it again._" Yikes. Another Patented Batman Ice-Cold Death-Glare was judiciously dispensed in Gar's general direction, making him wince. _Does this guy practice making scary glares in the mirror all the time, or something? _Gar wondered if all heroes went through a face-practicing stage, or something. He had too, when he was ten. He had a very scary leopard-face that he could make now. He distinctly remembered looking at the mirror and deciding exactly how scrunched up he should make his nose and...

Gar realized he should probably say something. After at least ten seconds' pause, he managed to say "I'm sorry. Uh, it won't... happen again?" He was squeaking. Damn that cracking voice. Damn it to hell.

A quick glance past Rachel's face revealed a satisfied look. A double-take glance and Rachel was blank again. He wasn't even sure if he had imagined Rachel's smugness or if he was being paranoid. _Jeez. That girl and her faces. I think I'll go insane if she keeps doing this_. While he was still contemplating the possibility of his imminent descent into clinical paranoia, Batman started speaking.

"We're going to start by training your freerunning in the mornings. While both Starfire and Raven can fly, and Beast Boy can if he's in a bird form, we do a _lot_ of running on Gotham's rooftops. I am _not_ going to have any of you slipping and falling to your deaths or some similar nonsense when all it takes to avoid that is a little gymnastics training. Gar got the distinct feeling that Batman's definition of "a little" was probably pretty different than most other peoples'.

Once he was done, Batman opened a steel door in one of the side walls and disappeared for a moment. After a few seconds, the steel on the wall that Batman had gone through lifted up into the ceiling, revealing an enormous Plexiglass window in front of a panel, which had dozens of controls on it. He flipped a couple of them, and to Gar's amazement, part of the floor started shrinking away. "What the f--" Victor sputtered, as the section of floor he was on started rising in the air. Suddenly they were all standing on a miniature cityscape-slash-obstacle-course-looking... thing. Gar had no idea what it was precisely, but the fact that the floor had just turned into a bunch of five-foot tall pretendy skyscrapers was pretty amazing. _Scratch that about the abandoned warehouse,_ Gar thought. _This place is kick-ass awesome._

Batman's voice came over some speaker or other in the wall. "You're all going to follow Dick. Do exactly what he does. I mean if he does a quadruple-flip mid jump, you do one too. If you break your neck, I'm awfully sorry." Gar raised an eyebrow. _'Awfully sorry?'_ As an afterthought, Batman fiddled with a lever behind the window, and the bottommost floor tiles started sprouting blue mats like they were growing grass.

Then Dick started sprinting down a row of floor-blocks. With a start, Gar realized he was supposed to follow, and he did, miming every leap, handspring, and assorted tomfoolery that Dick performed, wondering exactly how this assisted their speed. The others followed, with degrees of enthusiasm ranging from even-more-excited-than-normal in Kori's case to downright drudgery for Victor, who, being made of metal, was not precisely lithe and nimble.

Evidently Gar, who had done a lot of running through Forston, the little city that he'd guarded, was much better than the others, bar Dick, who was evidently some kind of gymnast freak anyway, and Batman, who was obviously far to Batman-like for him to surpass. Kori, at any rate, kept forgetting that she was supposed to be running, and would end up flying absentmindedly over half of the course. She looked almost crushed every time Batman called her out for this. Gar felt a little sorry for her. Korina Anders (or Kori'andr, as he supposed was her real name) could certainly be a little spacey sometimes.

The had spent what felt like an hour running around the constantly-shifting cityscape beneath their feet, and Gar became increasingly uncomfortable and even a little sweaty, much to his disgust. Dick was barely even breathing through his mouth, much to Gar's chagrin. Rachel was probably getting tired too, but Gar remembered she had mentioned the ability to heal herself and, he realized, she could probably flush the lactic acid out of her bloodstream with ease. That, or she was just in much better shape, than, for example, him. Gar doubted this. He had been running on rooftops since he was ten, albeit often in animal form, so he wasn't really sure it counted.

Vic was doing the worst. In fact, after the first half hour or so, he started sweating, and the water on his skin got in one of his systems. Obviously, this was not a good thing. There had been a bright flash as one of the wires in his arms short-circuited, and, cursing, he sat on the ground and started tweaking at it. Gar was pretty sure, though, after a half hour of him tweaking the same precise spot on his arm, that Victor was just hamming it up so he wouldn't have to cartwheel through the course. Pretty smart, actually, he thought, feet pounding, his breath coming to him in increasingly large gulps. He was really starting to get tired now. _Jeez, is Gotham even big enough that we would spend an hour running on the rooftops before we got where we were headed?_ he thought.

As if on cue, Batman came back into the room. "All right," he said. "You can all stop now." Dick, hanging on a rope, dropped to the floor. Rachel sat down, breathing heavily, though not looking to be in too bad shape, and Kori gave a strange happy/surprised noise before sitting eagerly on top of a floor-block. Victor, not far from Gar, jumped up to his feet, looking very happy, his "broken" arm forgotten. Gar coughed and nudged him, pointing. Sheepishly, Victor's arm went limp again. Gar wondered if Batman had noticed; although knowing Batman and his awesomeness, he probably had. Rachel raised yet another eyebrow. Gar wondered how many more eyebrow-raisings it would take before she could _lift weights _with that thing.

"You'll all be in better shape soon enough," Batman sighed. "We'll all go to the weight room now. We're going to start a training regimen to keep all of you in shape. Fighting insane mutated criminal masterminds is not something you want to do if you can only bench-press your own weight, or however much you kids can."

"Wait," Gar whispered, "I thought bench-pressing your weight was actually pretty _good._" Vic shrugged.

"I don't know, man. All I know is that anything is better than learning how to do some sort of gymnastics routine."

"Victor, stay here with Robin. Robin, why don't you give Victor a few pointers on... well, just give him some pointers on everything." Vic looked outraged. Gar, after a pause, looked outraged too, to make Victor feel better. Dick carted Victor away and they sat in a corner. Evidently Dick was trying to teach him the basic mechanics of a sommersault. Gar stifled a laugh, producing an extremely undignified snort instead. Curiously, Rachel's eyebrow stayed firmly in place in the normal eyebrow location of her face, he noticed, and then he realized that he was on some sort of permanent Rachel's-Eyebrows-Watch or something. Not a good sign. No, definitely not.

Batman led them into another part of the gym, a room that was gray-walled with black-tile flooring. In it, there were dozens of expensive-looking shiny metal weight-training systems. Free weights sat in racks in one corner, and half of the room was filled with medicine balls, floor-ladders, dodging cones, and dozens of physical-therapy thingamajigs and gizmos that Gar was not familliar with. Gar had never even seen some of them before, and half of the machines he had no idea how to work. As a thirteen-year old boy, Gar had never exactly had much weight-lifting experience. In fact, he was pretty sure it was unhealthy for someone of his age to start heavy lifting. Compressed bones' growth plates, or something.

"Excuse me," he interjected. "Isn't it unhealthy for someone of our age to start heavy lifting? Compresses bones' growth plates, or something," he said. "I _am _only thirteen," he added. "And I definitely have some growing to do. I mean, I hope so." He was still just short of five feet. In fact, he was one of the shortest boys in his class, much to his chagrin.

"We aren't going to be doing much heavy lifting -- not for muscle mass specifically. What we're going to do is conditioning, using a lot of the physical therapy equipment over there," Batman explained, gesturing. "I don't want any overexertion injuries, and to start off, we're just going to work on strengthening muscle groups for stability, things like that. Injury prevention stuff, mostly. When you're a little older we'll probably start more serious lifting." Gar winced. He could already tell he would be feeling their earlier run tommorow, and the thought of doing serious _anything _with a potential sadist like Bruce Wayne was... cowing. To say the least.

"Do any of you know how much you can bench press?" Kori raised a meek hand. "Kori?"

"Once, I lifted a bus," she said meekly. "I am not sure how much it weighed, though," she said, looking apologetic. "But it was filled with people. And most of them were what you would call... 'clinically obese.'" Gar winced again. Fantastic. With a girl who could probably lift cars with her pinky finger, a robot man, and another girl who could _move almost anything with her _mind, as well as _Batman_ and all the _Batmanny awesomeness_ that being something as awesome as _Batman_ entailed, he was probably going to be the weakest of them. Then he realized he could turn into a _Tyrannasaurous rex._ That made him feel a lot better, though he didn't think a _T. rex_ could bench-press much of anything with its stubby little arms. Dick, at least, wasn't very special, which made him feel better. It wasn't like he was _Batman_ or something. Yet.

"Oh. Well. I'm sure you can still benefit from, um, some... elastic band rotator-cuff exercises," Batman said, tying two things that looked like glorified rubber bands to a pole. "Hold on to this and rotate your shoulders outwards. Stand far enough back so that they feel pretty taut." Tongue between her teeth, Kori picked up the two bands and walked to the completely opposite corner of the room. Gar's sensitive ears could pick up a faint groaning from the elastic. Cheerfully, Kori pulled back as instructed.

The band broke, snapping violently towards the other side of the room, with enough force to knock one of the littlest weights off its rack. Gar coughed raucously for a few minutes, hiding his laughter. Batman glared (though not much more than usual, Gar thought sarcastically). Kori gave a muffled giggle. "Sorry!" Gar caught Rachel rolling her eyes.

They called off the rest of their training, before eleven o'clock, which was when they were supposed to stop. Gar had a feeling Batman would not be used to training anybody other than a completely normal human being. They all mooched around the Manor, drinking Pepsi and eating some really delicious candied-pineapple thingamajigs that evidently Alfred had made himself. He and Victor spent most of their time playing video games (though Gar suspected Victor of cheating... his current theory was he used "machine brain-waves" to rig the game... or something. At any rate, he knew Victor couldn't be winning fairly because Gar was pretty good at video games, or so he thought.) Rachel sat on one of the many luxuriously padded couches and read a very dusty-looking book, not dissimilar to the one she had read on the plane. Kori sat in a chair and observed all that was going on with a kind of fascination that Gar did not quite understand, and he wondered how long Kori'andr had been on this planet. Eventually, Dick, the only other one, entered the room and watched Gar and Vic play their game. Gar wondered if he would be able to bring himself to ask to join. As it was, Dick was promptly ignored, both boys' focus completely on the television.

At noon they all had lunch. Alfred had made some sort of vegetarian chili, only it was much better than vegetarian chili, because it was amazing. Gar had three bowls of it, though part of him wished he hadn't, because the bowls _had_ been pretty big. And chili did contain _beans_, after all. Everyone else had eaten a lot of it too, which was as bad, and he had a _very_ sensitive nose.

At 2:00 they were scheduled to train again. This time Dick was the only one training them; he asked everyone to fight him individually. Rachel was the first one to go. Everyone cleared away and watched.

The very first thing anyone noticed after Kori (the unofficial referee) told them to go was a very scary-looking crackling mass of obsidian encasing Robin, rendering him completely immobilized. "I'm pretty sure I just beat you," Rachel said dryly, just before one of Robin's gizmos exploded near where she was standing. There was a very bright electric flash, a little like a taser, and Rachel fell to the ground, the hem of her basketball shorts a little burned. While Rachel was on the ground, Robin had leapt straight up into the maze of rafters and pipes above their heads.

This hiding away was evidently pretty useless against Rachel, because a quick scan of the emotional signatures in the room revealed precisely where Robin was. Another black flash and she had removed Robin's belt. (Gar wished he had a picture, he was pretty certain he could make this look _very_ suggestive with the right wording.) "Don't do that again," she said, calling the belt to her hand. As soon as her hands closed around it, it delivered a very nasty-sounding crackling shock to her, making her yell. Dick dropped to the floor, grinning. He said something, which was probably provocative in some way, but Gar couldn't remember what, because after that something very scary happened.

Rachel's eyes started glowing white, and she floated into the air, gym clothes billowing, before a steel tile in the floor ripped itself out and started hurtling at Dick. Before it got more than ten feet from Robin, though, the gray-skinned girl collapsed on the floor, the glow in her eyes fading, and the tile crashed into the ground. Gar made a mental note to never let Rachel get all glowy on his ass, because that would mean he would probably be in for a beating.

Rachel was on the floor, panting slightly, before she looked up and saw the enormous gaping hole in the floor and the machinery that moved it. "Azar," she muttered, before standing up. "I need to go," she said, in possibly the flattest voice Gar had heard from her, and then there was some sort of black thing that went on around her and when he blinked his eyes she was gone.

And that was that. They didn't really do much else the rest of the day, and Rachel was nowhere to be seen. Gar spent most of the day trying to teach himself to twiddle a pen through his fingers.

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Coming up: Will Garfield Logan's long-held dreams of becoming a champion pen-spinner be realized?

Oh, and if anyone knows what the "get all glowy on his ass" came from, let me know. You can have an imaginary hug then. Except, you know, that would probably be a little weird. Maybe a brownie point instead.


	7. Chapter 7

AN: (For those who were wondering, the glowy on his ass reference comes from a popular picture on DeviantArt of Aang from Avatar sitting and looking grumpy, with the caption reading "Don't make me go all glowy on yo ass." Type in "aang" on DA's search thing, it should be near the top. It's pretty funny.)

(Yeah. Basically only a total Avatard like me would necessarily get it XD.)

contagiouschristian: Yeah, I know what you're saying. I tried to write it with a little less description, but one of my friends who read through it told me she had NO idea what I was talking about with the whole metal floor thing. I'm pretty sure I went a little overboard :P. I've always liked describing stuff, but sometimes it messes up the pacing and can get kinda boring. Thanks for the input. :D

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**Chapter Seven**

Gar didn't know how (or even if) Rachel had managed to completely get a grip back on herself, but the next morning, when he arrived promptly at 7:59 and 50 seconds, Raven was already there. He was just thinking of his new punctuality when Batman started speaking. Gar almost screamed.

"Toda--"

"DUDE! DON'T _DOOO_ THAT! YOU ALMOST GAVE ME A HEART ATTACK!"

Batman raised a cowled eyebrow. "I thought you had superhuman senses. Can't you hear my heartbeat?"

"Well, _yeah_, I _can_, but only if I _think _about it!" Gar said irritably, as if Batman was a two-year-old.

"You shouldn't _have_ to _think _about it." Batman, on the contrary, spoke as though Gar had just recently been birthed -- prematurely, and probably with a brain disorder. Gar's cheeks burned, turning his green skin a curious shade of brown.

"Yessir."

Bruce sighed. "We're both going to teach you all some fairly basic acrobatic moves. While some of you -- notably Beast Boy and Raven -- already have a lot of skill in freerunning and acrobatics, Starfire, who flies almost everywhere, and Cyborg, who in all fairness is made of steel, both do almost no acrobatic manuvers at all, which are useful both in movement and combat. So, we're all returning to the basics. Yes, Robin, even you." Batman glared slightly at Dick, who had given a tiny sigh that Gar thought was inaudible to most people. Dick closed his mouth and kept it that way.

"Tomorrow, a woman named Jodi Newson is coming and will help design any changes you might make to your current costume, if you wear any. You'll want to learn how to move better in them specifically, but we'll help you with really basic things today. New costumes shouldn't change how you perform these moves, unless you plan on adding a very tangly cape or a straitjacket or something to yours." Gar looked at what Batman was wearing, which was a very slick-looking black-and-gray armored suit and draping cape that led to the floor, and wondered if he would get something as amazing-looking. In Forston, he had a black spandex shirt and dark jeans, which he hoped he would never have to wear again. And the jeans had had a pretty embarrassing hole in the back for his tail. That was way too big. And kind of sagged down sometimes, and...

"All right. All of you need to learn something pretty basic, which is rolling into your landing after a long or high jump. The safest way to avoid cracking bones is to land with bent knees and go into a crouch, but a roll more or less preserves your momentum and also prevents injury, and if you're chasing someone, that's what you want to do. The best practice for this kind of thing is done out in Gotham itself, but for now we'll work on it in here. Batman gestured for them all to go stand in a particular area and then was nowhere to be seen. After a few seconds of not being seen ("He does that," Dick helpfully whispered) the floor went into it's amazingly awesome pretendy skyscraper mode from yesterday. This time it was mostly two or three flat surfaces with drops in between, with a couple of ramp-looking inclinations at random intervals.

"Robin, run away from me. Quickly," he added. Dick started sprinting away, running straight onto one of the ramps and leaping careeningly over the empty space between two of the rooftops. Instead of crouching at the landing to absorb the shock, like Gar probably would have done, Dick hit the ground and collapsed into a weird Power-Rangers-esque rolling-thing for a couple of rotations before fluidly hopping back onto his feet and continuing to run. Dick was obviously very good at what he was doing, because Bruce was unable to catch him.

"This is retarded," Vic muttered. "I would probably be fine if I was hurled out of the Sears-freakin'-_Tower _by _Superman._" Gar shrugged.

"I wouldn't complain, man. At least we're not learning cartwheels or something." Victor's face -- or at least the human side of it -- paled.

"Touche."

They spent literally two hours climbing up to high places, running off said high places, rolling around for a while, then climbing tediously back up to the aforementioned high places, only to run off of them in a _different direction_ this time, just to mix it up. It didn't help that they had to _never stop running_ the _entire freaking time._ Or that Dick kept telling him he was _doing it wrong. This to the guy who can turn into a freaking cat and be fine whenever he wants to _anyway, Gar thought sarcastically.

Finally they went into the weight room, and essentially did nothing but jumping jacks and tossing medicine balls to each other. For an hour. And the medicine balls weighed like fifty pounds or something, or they felt that way. And the jumping jacks... well okay, they weren't so bad, but they were supposed to do them continuously for _ten minutes._ And then Gar got thirsty. And he couldn't get a drink. Evidently he was supposed to bring water. Pricks.

After taking a very long and very hot shower, Gar retreated to his room with the intention to do nothing but sit in a vegetative state for at least an hour, and also drink a few gallons of water. Unfortunately, he realized as soon as he was done that he was also very ravenously hungry. They all ate breakfast of bacon/egg-stuff, except for Gar, who ate Pretendy Soymilk bacon/egg-stuff, which was delicious, and Kori, who ate a roasted artichoke, or that's what it looked like. She prepared it herself, electing not to let Alfred help her. Girls. Maybe it was part of the Atkins diet, or something. Kori offered a steamingly large helping to everyone, but they all declined, and she ate all five servings herself. Not a very good way to eat on a diet, Gar reflected. Maybe it had so few calories she could eat five servings and still be all right.

When they were done with breakfast, it was essentially lunchtime, and they all opted for lunch as well, much to Alfred's amusement. Even Rachel dug in to another round of food with aplomb that surprised everyone, especially Gar. Starfire helped herself to _another_ roasted artichoke. And she even ate the pointy stuff on the outside. Grossness.

Victor had come up with the brilliant idea of going out into the actual Gotham area for pizza after their afternoon session, which they all agreed to, even Rachel, who insisted they go somewhere that served tea or at least very hot water, and Gar, who insisted they go somewhere that served soycheese pizzas and a decent tomato sauce. Dick said he knew exactly where to go, which was some place called uncreatively "Pizza Pizza Pizza!" Gar was a little skeptical of a place with such a name, but he decided to give it a shot. Maybe it would be pretty good. They'd have to see.

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Gar was just digging into his sixth slice of pizza when Kori discovered mustard.

"Please, Victor, will you explain to me what this yellow object is?" she inquired, looking at it very closely.

"Um, that's a bottle of mustard, Kori," Vic said, looking confused.

"And please, what is mustard?" Kori began sniffing the side of the bottle.

"Weeellll... do you want the loooong story, or the short story?" Victor asked.

"I would like to know as much as I can about everything on this pla... in this country," she said. "Since I am from the country of Niger, which is a part of Earth," she added loudly. Gar stifled a laugh.

"Well, okay..." And, after a little glancing around and an adjusting of his hoodie and glasses, Vic's arm turned into a printer. Gar stared. After a few seconds, ten pages of information about various varieties of mustard, both the seed and the condiment, and even mustard bombs, were sitting in front of Kori. After a few seconds of reading, Kori gasped.

"Mustard is a _topping!_"

"Yeah, you kinda put it on sandwiches and..."

She then took the plastic bottle and ripped off the top half, dumping its contents on her pizza. Gar stared again, eyes wide.

"Um, Kori?" Dick nudged her. "It... it has a lid. You twist it and turn it upside down and squeeze, and _then _mustard comes out. You kinda don't... you know... destroy the bottle."

"Oh."

"You'll learn," Dick said tiredly.

After a few minutes of Kori unsuccessfully trying to put the broken bottle back together, Kori finally gave up and took a tentative bite of pizza, before letting out another Kori-gasp.

"IT IS DELICOUS!" And then she slurped up the mustard bottle's contents from the pizza. Gar's eyes nearly popped out of his head. Rachel raised _both_ of her eyebrows, eyes even slightly larger than normal. She must have been shocked. The other patrons of Pizza Pizza Pizza! turned their heads and stared.

"Sorry," Dick said. "She's from Africa. She isn't really used to the, um, creature comforts that we have here." Kori nodded eagerly, mustard gracing her chin like a goatee. Slowly everyone returned to their pizza. Dick hurriedly got up, paid for the pizza, and they left, walking all the way back to the Manor.

"That was interesting." Rachel's voice was dry. Gar suddenly went into a paroxysm of laughter, unable to stop himself. Dick and Victor joined in, and Kori started laughing uncertainly too, probably just to be included. Rachel covered her mouth, which Gar suspected strongly of being shaped in a vague smile-like-mouth-configuration. Perhaps Rachel was making progress.

Then a street light blew up. Rachel's face flushed breifly, and she looked like a stone after that. They were pretty quiet the rest of the way.

Then Kori asked a question. "Please, friend Victor, what is the ketchup?"

Gar started laughing again.


	8. Chapter 8

A.N: Sorry again for the delay, and the shortness of this story. But the next event is school starting for everyone, which is kind of weird to just stick in on the end or something.

**Chapter Eight**

The next day, the designer Bruce had promised them came, and they all went out in Gotham to meet in a fairly neutral location, one that wouldn't give away the fact that they were living in a billionaire playboy's mansion, or anything silly like that. As a matter of fact, they met in Newson's workplace, where she had a plethora of normal designer items (cotton, silk, a little leather here and there) and some very unusual things (safes with _labels_ that said things like "triple-weave flame-resistant carbon nanotube fibers") and just a couple of the very bizzare, including a block of metal that had a Post-it Note on it that simply read "From Tamaran." Kori imediatly eeped and went over, peering at it, tapping it with her fingernail, and even licking it, something Gar wished fervently he hadn't seen, because Kori's tongue was... interestingly colored, and it was "interestingly colored" in that it was purple. All five of them were assembled in her workplace, even Vic, who probably would not opt to wear any sort of costume, since he might set it on fire from an electrical surge, or something. Kori was wearing some sort of strange purple-cloth-and-metal thing, and Rachel was just wearing a long-sleeved black shirt and pants, and had an elegant-looking navy cloak draped around her shoulders. Dick wore his regular costume, the one he had worn when he had first met Beast Boy on patrol.

When Jodi came in the room, Gar realized he recognized her face, and then he remembered. While he had never learned her name, Jodi was the one who had made him a holoring, when he came to the States about five years ago. Well, so much for going to a location that was three hours away to preserve their identities, he thought. "Hi, everyone!" she said cheerfully. "So, Batman told me he was training a bunch of teenaged young 'uns, and he wanted me to outfit you all with something fairly protective. You can never have too many sets of nice, fancy, bulletproof threads, huh?" She smiled widely, walking around the room and looking at them individually. "And you'll all probably want some sort of hologram device as well, except for Robin, of course. Gar Logan!" she said finally, when she reached Gar. "I remember you! I made you a holoring... oh, it must have been at least five years ago. I heard some other designer made your uniform for the..."

_"Shut up!"_ Gar hissed.

"...or was that someone else? Yeah, I think it must have been," Jodi said smoothly. "Maybe they were talking about one of thsoe crazy Martian people, they've all got green skin too. I guess I just thought you were a random civillian who just _happened _to have green skin and a tail, but I guess I was wrong, hmm, Gar?" she added, waggling her eyebrows.

Gar grinned slightly, a little embarassed. He remembered Jodi pretty well; she had been warm and friendly and inviting to him, and one of the most understanding people he had met after his parents died.

"Cheeks still pretty fuzzy, I see," Jodi said cheerfully, looking at Gar's premature facial hair. "They were like that even when you were eight, right?"

"Yeah. It grows back overnight every time I try to shave it off."

"Anyway. Let's see," Jodi said, whipping out a sketchbook. "I guess Batman would probably want something that blended with the shadows or something, right?"

"Probably, yeah." Batman definitely had a thing for black stuff.

"But you'll want just a little color, I'm sure. How does a nice, smoky purple sound?" Jodi asked. Gar cringed. Why did she want him to wear his old, colors, anyway? Couldn't she tell he just wanted to distance himself from them?

Jodi started sketching, tongue between her teeth, as Gar said that yes, that sounded fine, thank you very much, and then she showed him what she had drawn, grinning widely. "Do you like it?" she asked, before adding a fluffy tail as an afterthought.

Gar took the sketchbook and examined the picture. The sketch showed a few smallish paddings around his chest, midriff, back, shoulders, and wrists, as well as the all-important groin, he noticed, and had a pair of combat boots drawn on as well. "The armored parts would be made of some shock-absorbing material or other -- I'll have to see what I have handy -- and the rest of it would be some Kelvar cloth material, nothing too restricting, or you wouldn't really be able to move. I was thinking the padding would be dark purple, and the rest of it be black. Except for the little part there," she added cheerfully, indicating the groin area. "You probably don't want it standing out too much." Gar smiled uncomfortably.

"That sounds... good. Um, can I get a pair of gloves, too?" he asked, flashing his fingers, which ended in some nasty-looking black retractable claws. "I don't really like the whole... clawy thing. I guess you can put holes for them to go through when they're out, but I don't want people thinking they're a parrt of my actual body. It's just a... it's a thing I have," he explained, looking at Jodi's inquiring look. He had always worn gloves in some form back in Forston, and even before that, with the Patrol.

"That's fine," Jodi said. "I'll make some gloves too." Jodi added a couple of lines to the picture to suggest the presence of gloves. "So, how does it look?"

"It looks pretty good," Gar said. "Thanks a lot, Jodi." Gar was glad he was done. Why was Jodi trying to make him wear an outfit like he had before? Why did she think he had left the Doom Patrol, if not to distance himself from it? And now she wanted him to wear some sort of throwback to it, or something. Ugh. But honestly, he liked purple and black a lot, and he didn't want to draw any attention to his earlier times on the Doom Patrol by refusing to wear his old colors.

"Great! Now, can we just take some measurements?" Jodi took out a very worn-looking tape measure, and started dashing around Gar for at least five minutes, jotting down measurements of his legs, his neck, his arms, his tail, the width of his tail, width of his legs, width of his arms, approximate length of his deltoid muscle, and so on, until Gar was almost dizzy. _She had better make this thing fit right_, he thought, _with all the time she's taking measuring me_. Then she was done, and she moved on, whispering in his ear as she passed.

"They were good people."

He cringed as she moved on.

---------------

Gar didn't pay much attention after he was fitted, instead he sat down and started reading an old torn-up paperback novel that had been sitting on Jodi's desk (a bodice-ripper; there was no accounting for taste, he supposed). He did notice that Dick said something to Jodi before they left, prompting Jodi to go into another storm of measurement-takings, which Gar found to be an odd releif. Dick took the pencil Jodi used and drew something on her pad; Gar saw Jodi nodding, and then they all left, wandering through the better section of Gotham for the better part of an hour.

It turned out that Dick knew practically every square foot of Gotham, which Gar guessed wasn't that surprising. In fact, as they were walking along, Dick warned him of large crack in the pavement Gar hadn't noticed. And Dick wasn't even looking at the ground, instead he was peering into a shop window. He wondered if Dick was showing off, or if he really did know every crack in the sidwalks of Gotham. Gar was pretty sure he was showing off.

They passed by a locally-owned bookstore, and Rachel dissapeared into it, saying she would come back to the Manor later. Dick seemed like he was about to warn her to be safe, but then he seemed to think better of it. Rachel could probably make would-be muggers leave with one of her nastier looks, no magic needed.

---------------**August 21st**---------------

For the rest of the week, they did more or less the same thing each day: get up suffocatingly early, train with Batman (who got even scarier and meaner with each passing day, Gar noticed) eat some food, sit around, eat some more food, train again, eat a little extra food, and then wander pointlessly around Gotham, which was actually pretty awesome, because Gotham had some _extremely funky_ places. A prime example would be Joe's _Army Jackets_, which did nothing but sell _vintage Vietnam combat jackets._ Which, he had to admit, was amazing. And the guy who owned it, Joe, was _insane._ Gar swore he was Gotham's next crazy-assed psychotic villian. Dick said, no, he probably wasn't, but Joe had the most _amazingly awesome_ conspiracy theory about armies of gerbils trained by the British that would take over the world. Gar was pretty sure he was on to something, as a matter of fact. Even if he was psychotic, which he definitely was.

But on the seven-day anniversary of their arrival to Gotham, they met Batgirl, who was actually Barbara/Barb/Babs (she went by three different names), the daughter of the _Police Cheif_, Jim Gordon, which was only surprising to Gar because it was so unsurprising as to be actually surprising. After all, daughter of one of the last completely non-corrupt policemen in Gotham, becoming a masked crime-fighting vigilante at night. No one saw _that_ coming, he thought sarcastically, no sir!

And Batgirl was very good at what she did. When Gar tried to fight her the first morning she trained with them, she threw him on the floor with enough force to make him think that the lights on the ceiling were actually birds that were made of circles. Batman, after breifly checking to make sure he hadn't been silly enough to let his skull fracture, let him leave and eat some of Alfred's brownies afterward, which made up for it, Gar supposed. He found them curiously emotional and poetic for all of thirty minutes, after which he started regaining most of his normal higher-brain functions.

After ten minutes, Kori joined him in his brownie-gorging, which was surprising. Unfortunately, Tameraneans were evidently all allergic to chocolate, meaning that Kori was even more out of it for the rest of the day than he was. Kori spent almost an hour lecturing him on the digestive system of _blorchoths_, which was actually pretty interesting, even after Bab's World Wrestling Association head-slam effects had worn off.

Then, after just another hadful of days, they were scheduled to start their higher education at Gotham Acadamey, and on August 29th, Jodi came in and gave them all their holorings and costumes. Gar had to admit that any normal anxiety about starting his freshman year was basically nonexistant. After all, taking Geometry class would _probably_ not be as bad as being trained by Batman. And he was pretty sure that girls would be magnetically attracted to him, even if he was a little young for a freshman and lacked his amazing elflike pointed ears when he donned his holoring. He even found himself looking forward to it, since it meant less painful "conditioning" by Batman. Even getting up an hour earlier was a worthy sacrifice.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

His alarm rang out insistently, shattering the warm silence of the dream he'd been having -- something about a bear and a table, but even as he groggily contemplated this, his alarm buzzed again, and he violently punched it, sitting up and yawning widely. Oh yes -- the school. Holoring on, crisp white shirt, long black pants, an annoyingly hard-to-fix tie that he finally left draped around the collar after a couple of fruitless attempts to tighten it. He sincerely hoped he could make it through the day without choking.

Check the batteries (fine, of course, and no surprise there) put on some music (this morning, for some reason, the dulcet tones of My Chemical Romance -- he winced and put his player on shuffle quickly, wondering how on earth _that'd_ managed to get in his collection.) He ambled downstairs and then ate an entire stack of pancakes (or… crepes, or something -- he was too not-awake to tell) and drank a very delicious glass of chocolate milk. Gar, unusually, was already downstairs, looking very perky (and, dare Victor add, preppy) in a purple tie, black pants, and another starchy white shirt. "It's a brand-new day, Victor," he chirped, downing another bowl of what appeared to be raw-sugar-and-milk. "No, it's a brand new _year_!" he cried enthusiastically. "Put on a happy face, man."

Victor mustered a smile. "Man, you're excited, aren't you?" Gar merely grinned.

---------------

Gotham Academy's campus seemed to fit right in with the stone-and-gargoyle somber look of Old Gotham, but inside, the five of them found, the students were as loud, talkative, and even rebellious as any others at any other school -- or at least as loud/talkative/rebellious as one could expect from a school where full tuition cost about as much as a small house. Dozens of students were scuttling around, laughing, grinning, hugging old friends, pouting in corners, popping bubblegum, jamming out to vaguely frightening music, and generally doing almost any activity imaginable. Gar finally managed to find his first period class, Art, by a vague smell of turpentine he caught in the hallway, and he dragged Kori into it with him. Kori was the only person who shared this class with him he had even seen before in his life.

Timidly he sat down at the end of a table, looking slightly confused. Two sophomores were already cheerfully conversing with one another --

"... so anyway, this crazy bitch goes up and she…"

-- Kori watched them with wide, staring eyes and a slightly open mouth. Gar reached over as unobtrusively as possible and shut it for her, and then she clamped her jaw shut, muscles standing out in her cheeks.

"Well that's obviously a pretty fucking _stupid_ thing to say considering _you_ were…" his friend interrupted with a grin.

"Oh, shut up. Cock-fuck," he added for good measure.

Kori gasped. Gar sighed and dragged her behind a pile of canvases near the kiln.

"Korina Anders. Do. Not. Say. A. _Word._"

"Friend Garfield," Kori started indignantly.

"Kori, I am perfectly serious." Gar looked at her very seriously, to show how serious he was being. Kori closed her mouth.

They colored in silence the rest of the period.

---------------

There were three lunch periods at the Academy, and Gar ended up not being able to find any of the other four, or even Babs, who was a sophomore, so he ended up arbitrarily picking a section of table/bench that was next to a very friendly girl who played the cello and shared his math class and a cheery junior who played varsity football and had taken a liking to him. Cello Girl was not eating lunch and followed him into the cafeteria, trying to make small talk about their classes, their teachers, the gay English teacher with the moustache, et cetera, et cetera. Gar sat down and took a peek in the lunch box that Alfred had thoughtfully prepared, eyes widening.

"Dude…" the girl said, sniffing. "Is that… _Indian food?_"

"…Yep." Tofu tikka masala, he supposed. Junior Boy came back from the lunch line with a chicken patty that was shaped like a duck foot and a cookie, and stared enviously (and perhaps hintingly) at Gar.

"You know," he said, taking a massive and suggestive bite of his chicken. "As a member of the football team I work out a lot and need to get a lot of calories." Gar spooned some curry-thing into his mouth. "A _lot_," he added, looking irritated.

And then Rachel walked by where he was sitting, flopping down on the stool next to him. "Hey, uh…" Gar stuttered, before noticing that Rachel looked oddly desperate. "Hi!" he finished cheerfully.

"H-hello," Rachel said after a moment's thought, opening her lunchbox and thoughtlessly spearing a little gulab jamun with her fork.

"Oh, aren't those _good!_" Gar cried out before he could stop himself. Junior Boy looked at him with a sort of cold, controlled hatred, which made Cello Girl smirk. Rachel said nothing and simply looked at her food. She looked vaguely disturbed. Gar felt bad for her.

"She your girlfriend or something?" Cello Girl asked conversationally, looking (he hoped) a little disappointed.

"Yeah," he scoffed. "That's it _exactly_." Junior Boy and Cello Girl both looked surprised.

"He was being sarcastic," Rachel finally supplied, nibbling on a piece of chicken.

"Ohhh. Hahaha," Junior Boy chuckled unconvincingly. Rachel visibly restrained herself from rolling her eyes and popped the piece of chicken in her mouth. Gar held back a grin.

Cello Girl did most of the talking for the next thirty minutes, and Gar and Rachel did most of the eating. Junior Boy (possibly, Gar remembered, named Tom) did most of the hinting and complaining about the poor quality of the cafeteria food. After that Gar had German class and Biology, which was taught by an overweight and slightly comical-looking woman wearing a mumu, who did not, he discovered with indignation, know her subject _at all _-- she couldn't even say what family sugar gliders came from. Gar could have done a better job teaching the class himself.

Then, two periods and two hours of looking at syllabi later, the first day of school was over. The five of them met outside -- Babs was busy talking to one of her friends and didn't see them. Apparently they were to walk all the way back to the Manor -- which was only a few miles away, fortunately.

Kori chattered the whole way home. "Oh, this was such a strange and _interesting_ experience," she prattled, "and I almost kissed my French teacher on the lips but _fortunately_" -- she grinned dazzlingly -- "dear friend Victor stopped me and explained that…" and so forth. Dick gritted his teeth slightly.

There was absolutely no homework for any of them to do that night, so they all ate a little food before Bruce told them to "meet downstairs, we're going out." (Thank God he didn't say "To the Batcave, young 'uns!" or some such nonsense.) Gar scrambled into his Kevlar suit and swallowed uncomfortably, standing around and scratching his irritatingly fuzzy cheeks. "Loosen up," Raven said casually. "You're probably safer here than you were back in Forston. Welll… actually, no, you're not," she finished dryly. "I don't think they had any psychotic supervillians from where you come."

Way to cheer me up, Raven, Gar thought nervously, and then they left.

---------------

A/N: Hi all! I'm sorry I've abandoned you, et cetera, life has been busy/hectic for me, et cetera. You can actually expect another chapter within an actually short period of time, I promise. ^_^ (yes, I realize this chapter is annoyingly short. I'm sorry.)


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